Growing Up Unstable
by SideshowStarlet
Summary: Chronicles Harry's struggles with mental illness and the effect it has on the Wizarding world. Inspired by the musical "Next to Normal," though chapters are not songfics.
1. Prologue

**Prologue: Let There be Light **

"_Let there be light, _

_Now at last, let there be light. _

_We've been sitting in the dark for far too long, _

_An endless night." _

_-Next to Normal_

Sirius sat bolt upright in bed, drenched in sweat, awakened in the middle of the night by yet another nightmare. Another twisted reminder of the past. In the dream version, he _didn't _escape the Dementors.

Sighing tiredly, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and kicked at the filthy floor with his bare feet.

Ironically, it was this dismal house, the site of so many unpleasant childhood memories, that so many people were now gathered in to fight for the Light. It had seemed impossible that anything good could ever come from this wretched place. Now this sanctuary against the forces of darkness and Ministerial meddling seemed all they had. Their own secret weapon.

Some weapon. To Sirius, it was like another Azkaban, particularly as Dumbledore insisted upon keeping him under house arrest.

Sirius waved his wand and released a beam of light into the pitch-dark room. It didn't help. The bright beam of light only seemed to throw the grime on the walls, the dust on the furniture, and his ancestors' grim taste in interior decorating into sharp relief. Half the room seemed to be in shadow now. That was probably the good half.

He sighed again, leaning his head back against the wall, knowing that he would spend another sleepless night worrying about the future. Worrying about the day the _Daily Prophet _would start reporting those little tidbits about Harry that Dumbledore had managed to keep quiet all these years. His fifteen year-old godson had been through enough without those stories coming out. Sirius knew all Hell would break loose if certain details were reported. Worrying about when Voldemort would come out of hiding and make his move on an unsuspecting, determinedly ignorant populace. Wondering how in Merlin's name the Light was going to survive all this.

Still, Harry _had _survived the Killing Curse as a baby. He _did _have a hand in keeping Sirius from being sent back to prison. Both of these things were thought to be impossible. Maybe, just maybe, they could bring light back into their world as well.

* * *

Meanwhile, Harry had slipped out of the room he was staying in and had snuck down to the kitchen for a sleepless night of his own. _"Lumos," _he muttered, waving his wand and illuminating the ancient haven of several generations' worth of House-Elves. It was, for the most part, cleaner than the rest of the house, and, as the owners of the house traditionally never set foot in the kitchen, the ancient members of the Noble House of Black had seen no reason to impose their unique approach to interior design on this room.

It would have been almost comfortable, a true sanctuary from everything that had been going on since before he found out about this stupid, wonderful, magical world.

He knew he shouldn't push it, knew that he had a trial coming up for using underage magic in a Muggle suburb, but he also knew that the Ministry would never be able to pick up on his magic usage in a Wizarding house. Besides, he needed the light.

All summer, he had only caught glimpses of the man who's helped him for so long. The older man was out now, fighting against the forces of evil (what Harry wished he could be doing at this moment), but Harry was determined to wait for him, staying up all night if he had to.

Harry wasn't even certain if the man would be back tonight; he had already waited up for him almost every night of his stay in Grimmauld Place, with only a few glimpses of the man's familiar face, a few words of conversation. Harry yearned for the man to appear and sit with him, put his fears to rest, reassure him that the light will vanquish the darkness.

"_He'll be here soon-tonight; I know he will," _Harry told himself. _"When he finally comes, I'll wonder how I made it so long without him." _

Harry hoped his mentor arrived soon. He lay on his back on the cold kitchen tile and brought his legs up to lean against the cupboard. A veteran of enforced sleeplessness, he knew that the deliberately uncomfortable position would prevent his exhausted body from falling asleep before he arrived.

Everything great he'd done since entering the Wizarding World- and probably even before that- had been thanks to this great man. The world thought it was the great Harry Potter doing all these wonderful things, but in truth, he could never have done any of those things without his mentor to guide him. Now that Voldemort was back again, everyone who believed in the Dark Lord's resurrection (who wasn't actively on his side) was looking to him to fight the coming war against darkness.

With what? His incomplete Hogwarts education and the shiny light of specialness in his heart? Harry didn't think he had any light except what that the man he was waiting for had given him.

He _needed _him. Now more than ever.

**A/N: Hope you enjoyed the first chapter. Chapter two is already done and will be uploaded momentarily. This story's timeline jumps around from one chapter to another, flashing back and fast-forwarding, but it'll still be understandable. Trust me, there's a method to the madness.**

**Next, I will finish writing the first chapter of "The Dark Lord's Sassy Gay Frenemy" (about ¾ of the way through that), and a good time will be had by all.**

**In real life news, I am now a Registered Nurse. Still looking for work, but I know I'll have a job soon. At least, I hope I will. **


	2. Just Another Day

**Chapter One: Just Another Day **

"_For just another day, _

_For another stolen hour, _

_When the world will feel my power and obey." _

_-Next to Normal _

"What are you doing up?" A deep voice echoed throughout the refurbished, but still small, cupboard under the stairs. "It's three-thirty."

Harry hopped off the cot and stumbled slightly as he found himself on his feet for the first time in several hours. He may have stayed awake, but his entire lower body had fallen asleep. Neither the man nor the boy slept in the hard wooden cot, preferring to use it as a dining room table for those occasions when they managed to sneak food into the makeshift bedroom, and finding it much more comfortable to curl up at the end of the day in a nest of blankets on the floor.

Tonight, however, Harry had been torturing himself, sitting on the cot half the night in an attempt to keep himself as uncomfortable as possible. All to ensure that he would be awake for his father's arrival… if he came back. Sometimes, days went by during which Harry never saw the man, and he feared that his dad was gone for good. But he had always come back with a pocket full of cash, gifts for Harry, and, often, wounds bearing witness to the physical battles that were the price of the prizes.

He looked his father up and down. No new injuries this time, and that cut on his arm was healing nicely. Harry could breathe again.

Harry popped his back and gave his best death glare, which, ironically enough, had been taught by the recipient of said glare. "This is the seventh night this week I sat 'til morning." Harry's voice didn't sound angry, as one would expect after depriving oneself of sleep and waiting up for someone into the early hours of the morning. Instead, his tone betrayed a mixture of anxiety and downright fear. There was always that uncertainty, always that lingering worry that the man he was waiting for would disappear for good.

The man sighed, as if he had been expecting this, although Harry had been asleep when he got back the last few times he snuck in late. Apparently, it was too much to hope that the two of them could go an extended period of time without once again descending into the recurring nighttime argument. "Where-Have-You-Been-I've-Been-Worried-Sick?" The epic father-son drama screened all over the world, translated into every language on the planet. Of course, in this case, the roles were reversed.

"Imagining the ways you might have died," Harry continued, fear clouding his normally bright green eyes, eyes already hazed over from tiredness.

The man gave a barely audible groan. Really, the way Harry acted, you'd think Harry was the father and _he _was the ten-year-old boy. "And tonight's winner is?"

"In a freak summer icestorm with no warning," Harry replied promptly.

Pause. "Because _that_ happens…" the man said slowly.

"There's undercover cops, security cameras, and burglar alarms," Harry continued, having some idea of what his father did at night, while the Dursleys thought the man was working the night shift at the mill.

"There's a gang war, there's the bird flu, trains collide," the man continued. "It's not going to stop me from doing what I gotta do to take care of us. It never stops _you _either when I take you out with me. You always wind up enjoying it. And when have we ever gotten caught?"

His father did have a point. Still, Harry wasn't about to be dissuaded. "You act sensible and surly, but you swore you'd come back early, and you lied." Harry plopped down on the cot, which creaked threateningly from the force of his fall. This wasn't the best choice, given how uncomfortable the cot was, but he had to take the weight off his aching legs somehow. He rubbed a hand tiredly over his eyes.

Harry's father sighed again, this time sounding more melancholy than annoyed. He knelt down in front of the cot Harry was sitting on and grasped the boy's hands. "You gotta stop waiting up for me, kid. You're almost eleven. You don't need to be tucked in every night. Besides, you _know _I'll always come back, don't you? Don't you?" Now the man's normally confident, commanding voice became laced with something like fear. "When you were five and thought you were an orphan and stuck with just the _Dursleys _as _family_, I found you. I know I can't take you away from here, and Vernon and Petunia would love nothing more than to be rid of me, but I'll never be too far away." Harry's father gazed pleadingly into his son's eyes.

This touching father-son moment lasted all of… a moment.

"What took you so long tonight?" Harry asked, pulling his hands out of his father's grasp and folding his arms. "Are the police after you?"

"Not at the moment," the man responded truthfully as he stood up. It had been a close call, but he escaped, as he always had.

Harry opened his mouth to reply, but the two of them were interrupted by a set of heavy footsteps outside the cupboard door and a voice. "Harry? What are you doing?"

"It's Dudley! Quick- in the corner!"

The man sat down in the corner to the left of the cupboard door. They both knew from experience that even when the door was completely open, nothing in that corner could be seen. It was a blind spot, hidden to anyone standing outside the cupboard. Harry piled some blankets onto his huddled father, just in case.

"Why does your entire foster family hate me?" the man whispered, a rather put-upon expression flitting its way across his handsome features before his head disappeared under a moldy gray blanket.

"Well, Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon hate your guts," Harry conceded fairly. "And mine, too. We're not exactly normal- or anywhere next to normal. But Dudley… I doubt he even knows you exist."

Harry silently opened the door to find Dudley standing there in misbuttoned purple pajamas, staring at him. "Dudley? It's, like, four in the morning." Harry repressed a smirk, knowing that as soon as Dudley disappeared back upstairs, he and his father would spend an enjoyable night sniggering about Dudley's ridiculous nightwear, all arguments forgotten.

"I came down for a snack, and I heard voices," Dudley explained. "Who were you talking to?" he asked, peering over Harry's shoulder into the cupboard in a fruitless attempt to find his cousin's "guest."

"That was just me, talking to myself. You know, the usual." Harry knew Dudley would find this easy to believe, as Dudley Dursley had spent much of his young life hearing his parents' shouted claims that Harry was crazy. Ironically, they were never worried about one of the neighbors overhearing one of their "Omigod-Our-Nephew-Belongs-In-A-Loony-Bin" rants.

At one time, Dudley used this as an excuse to bully Harry- not that he really needed an excuse to bully any of his peers- but, whatever, it gave him some good insults to throw at his smaller cousin as he pounded the boy into raw hamburger; that's all that mattered (besides the actual punching, of course). However, due to the behind-the-scenes efforts of Harry's father, the stupidly gullible Dudley managed to convince himself that Harry had access to some sort of higher power.

When they were eight years old, Dudley and his moronic minions had crouched their considerable bulk behind some bushes in an attempt to conceal themselves from that odd Harry Potter and pelt him with water balloons when he got close enough. The fact that it was in the winter when Dudley hatched this _brilliant_ plan did make the idea more sadistic, which was probably what his cousin was going for. However, the chill in the air also compromised the bushes that the boys were using as hiding places. Even at full bloom, the shrubs would have had a difficult time concealing the well-fed boys. During the winter, the bushes were reduced to mere twigs sticking up out of the ground. Despite the boys' matching camo gear, everybody knew they were there. They became the subject of many odd looks by the inhabitants of Privet Drive who were willing to brave the cold weather to venture outside that day.

Now, if something was obvious to the inhabitants of Privet Drive, Harry's father could probably see it with his eyes closed. One minute, the man had been out walking with Harry, the two of them enjoying a lively discussion somewhere out of earshot of Petunia Dursley, who would shriek at Harry for even speaking to the "Drunken criminal" who helped bring him into this fucked up world. The next minute, Harry was standing alone on the sidewalk as his father pulled himself onto the roof of Number 15 Privet Drive with one hand while holding Number 15's garden hose bent in the other hand. Harry had been so involved in the discussion about various sports cars with his father that he had not noticed Dudley and his friends until he was within throwing distance. Harry froze as the boys all raised their balloons.

However, their attack was interrupted by a jet of icy water descending onto their heads, baptizing them with perfectly ordinary Privet Drive tap water in a half-assed attempt at symbolism.

Dudley's gang had looked up to the sky, where they must have thought the water had come from, completely missing Harry's father standing on the roof with a water hose still in his hand. Terrified "Big-D's" gang dropped their balloons and ran as far away as their limited stamina allowed.

There had been other incidents throughout the years, all initiated by Harry's father, and all with the same result: Dudley became too intimidated to go after Harry, or even send any of his classmates after Harry.

However, Harry was just too _freakish, _as mum and dad put it, for Dudley to ever enjoy Harry's company. Too odd. Too _different. _So, for the most part, Dudley tried to avoid Harry whenever he could. His life was much less complicated, closer to normal, that way.

Lately, though, he had been wondering if Harry's _strangeness _could have contributed to his smaller cousin's ability to escape and exact revenge on him. Dudley didn't want to go completely 'round the bend like his cousin. But, it would be cool to have a little bit of what Harry had if it made him stronger. The best part was he, unlike Harry, knew how to _act _normal. So, no matter how odd the weird shit made him _feel, _he just needed to remember to act as he usually did, and nobody would be the wiser. So, lately, whenever Dudley saw the opportunity to investigate his cousin (and nobody was around to see him _talking _to Harry), Dudley tried to figure out Harry's secret. So far, he had gained nothing other than an even stronger conviction that Harry Potter was clinically insane.

Harry had found that the nuttier he acted, the more likely the Dursleys were to leave him alone. Of course, it was a balancing act. He didn't want to act so abnormal that Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon to lock him in his cupboard, even if his father always acquired extra treats for him whenever he was being punished. It helped that most of the time he was punished had something to do with dear old dad, whether it was something unusual dad did that, against all logic, Harry got blamed for or the fact that, father or not, Harry was consorting with "that man" where the neighbors could see.

Harry smiled blissfully, gazing into Dudley's blue eyes, his face bearing the loony expression of an ax-murderer about to take a swing. "I'm fine, really," he said, in a distant voice that he often practiced in front of a mirror for this very occasion. "Go into the kitchen, and I'll make you a snack."

"You sure you're okay to use the stove?" Dudley asked uncertainly, remembering _last_ time.

Harry's purposefully insane smile widened further. "Go!" he insisted loudly as he waved an arm towards the kitchen, giggling maniacally. There. Now if this didn't send Dudley hurrying upstairs as quickly as his fat legs could carry him, then nothing wo-

"Okay!" Dudley said, his enthusiastic voice interrupting Harry's thoughts. Crazy or not, he did love Harry's cooking.

"Dammit," Harry said as his cousin ran off towards the kitchen. He sighed. "Hungry?" he asked his father, who was pulling the blankets off himself now that Dudley had gone away.

"Am I allowed to come out of hiding, or must I consume the proffered items in the dungeon?" the man asked sarcastically, while glancing around the gloomy-looking cupboard that no amount of fixing-up could ever make homelike.

"You can come out I guess. It's only Dudley. I don't see what difference it makes eating in front of him or a blank wall, but if it makes you happy…"

"I am most exceedingly obliged for the momentous privilege," Harry's father said, giving a courtly bow as he stood up.

"Yeah, yeah, just get lost before my aunt and uncle come down, will ya? I don't want to be stuck in here all summer." The man nodded in understanding.

Father and son made their way into the kitchen, where Dudley was already waiting expectantly at the table.

"Dudley, don't tell your mum and dad about any of this, clear?" Harry asked, while Harry's father glared at the plump boy as one would a most hated enemy who had just stepped in something smelly and tracked it all over the clean floor.

"Yeah," agreed Dudley, who wasn't about to give up an opportunity to enjoy Harry's cooking.

On those occasions in which Harry was allowed (read: forced) to have a meal with the Dursleys (chiefly when Vernon's sister Marge was visiting so the foul woman could have Harry under her eye at all times and boom out suggestions for improvement), his father was not allowed to attend. In fact, when his father was at Number Four, most of his time was spent in the cupboard under the stairs. Harry, knowing what it felt like to be cooped up under there, could hardly blame the man for wanting to come out.

Harry pulled out the chair he usually sat in for his father and helped the man into the seat. Even if he didn't show it, Harry was sure the man was exhausted. His father had been out doing what he does for a living since noon the previous day. He deserved some time to relax.

He thought briefly about how Aunt Petunia acted when Uncle Vernon came home from his job as a director at Grunnings. Vernon's job didn't sound like anything strenuous or risky like Harry's father's job, and the 9 to 5 hours were certainly more convenient than the long, unpredictable hours Harry's dad had to be away. However, Aunt Petunia always coddled Uncle Vernon when he came home from work, setting him up with the evening paper, fetching him before-dinner snacks, doing everything she could in order to ensure her hardworking husband was comfortable.

With that in mind, Harry cooked up some French toast, and, despite Dudley's salivating, cooked up a bunch for his father and served him before even starting on Dudley's much smaller portion. Harry snickered to himself. If Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon were here, he would get so much shit for "depriving precious Dinky-Duddydums of the nourishment he needs to grow big and strong."

Then again, his father had been working in the summer heat, and it had been a hot summer, hitting record high temperatures. Some people on the telly were calling it "global warming," which always caused Uncle Vernon to snort contemptuously. Whatever the cause of the sweltering heat, dad needed plenty of liquids. So, Harry abandoned Dudley's snack to mix up a large jug of orange juice for his father.

Of course, if dad was not stopping for afternoon water breaks, he was probably working through lunch as well. The man needed more than just French toast. He needed some protein in between those bread slices. Let's see… wow, the Dursleys sure had a lot of stuff in their refrigerator. It's strange to think that in the olden days, a man had to take his rifle or pistol or bow and arrow, track an animal in the forest, and risk life and limb to pursue the perfect prey.

Nowadays, the modern man trekked his way to the kitchen and opened that giant, giant door. A light bright as dawn clicked on, and he was faced with an entire jungle full of dead animals, plants pulled out of every imaginable surface, and every possible concoction of grease, sugar, and lard. It was fantastic.

The great thing about sandwiches was that you could stick anything in between two pieces of bread and declare it a sandwich, and therefore, lunch. There's turkey, salami, and roast beef and ham. Egg salad and tuna and honey and jam. Lettuce and radish and cucumber slices. Leftover meatballs and unopened spices. Potatoes, tomatoes, salmon, and cheese. Sweet and spicy dill pickles; I'll take twelve, please.

Harry giggled, throwing random ingredients onto the bread slices and smashing two of them together before tossing the finished product into his father's general direction. He was the Picasso of sandwiches-making into an art like the prim and proper Aunt Petunia never could. Most of the ingredients flopped to the floor before making it to their destination.

Harry's father managed to snatch two out of midair simultaneously as they came zooming towards him, one in both hands. The man alternated between biting out of a chicken-rosemary-tomato-meatball sandwich and a peanut butter-honey-tuna-ham-and-pickle deluxe. He ate like a man who hadn't had a meal in years, taking as big a bite as possible and hardly taking any time to chew and swallow before stuffing his mouth again.

Around him, sandwiches flew and fell apart like poorly designed flying submarines. That you can eat. He shot a smirk at Dudley, whose plate remained empty despite Harry's increasingly erratic throws. Kid needed to lose some weight, anyway.

At some point, Harry found it hilarious to scream "Dinnertime!" in an increasingly loud voice every time he let loose an edible missile. This went on for six or seven sandwiches before the neighbor's dog began to bark.

Dudley got up from his place at the table but simply stood still, holding onto his chair for support, as if he wanted to intervene in the crazy situation but didn't want to come too close. "Harry?" he asked his cousin uncertainly.

Then, a series of thumps echoed throughout the house, coming closer and closer. A stampede? No, just Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, bounding downstairs to witness the latest bit of bedlam unfolding in their perfectly normal house.

The usual reactions: Uncle Vernon bellowed; Aunt Petunia shrieked; Dudley stood there dumbly surveying the scene; Harry's father appeared to thrive on the chaos. Harry kept making sandwiches, oblivious to the presence of the two least delightful members of his family.

It was only when Aunt Petunia pulled him by the ear away from the refrigerator that Harry noticed the presence of the two newcomers. At this point, he froze, and his father immediately put down his sandwiches to tug his son out of Aunt Petunia's long-fingernailed clutches.

He frowned. At this point, Harry could barely stand on his own two feet. He kept swaying as if he would keel over from sheer exhaustion. "I think the room is spinning," the boy mumbled, voice muffled against his father's chest.

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!" shrieked Aunt Petunia, surveying her ruined kitchen.

"And yet, sooner or later, we all kill our fathers and marry our mothers," Uncle Vernon philosophized in a booming voice.

"What?" Harry asked, confused.

"We told you we don't care if you stay in your cupboard 'til your dying day; you're not coming out again until you start showing some gratitude! After all we did for you…" Aunt Petunia went ranting on about the worthlessness of the Potters and Harry in particular as Harry, abandoning all pretense of standing up on his own, collapsed to the floor at his father's feet and sat on the cool tile, leaning against his father's legs. His dad bent down to put his hands on Harry's shoulders. Christ, he must look bad if his father was focusing on holding him up in a sitting position instead of attacking Aunt Petunia for the crap coming out of her mouth.

Not noticing her nephew's weakened state, or more likely, not caring, Aunt Petunia shoved a mop into her nephew's arms and ordered him to "Clean up this mess," then dragged Dudley back upstairs, as if she was just too exhausted to deal with this shit right now, all the while moaning that Harry had "Ruined precious Duddy's birthday."

When the Dursleys had stomped back up to bed, Harry's father lifted his small son and carried him into their cupboard. The boy was way too light. When was the last time he had eaten? The Dursleys could barely be bothered to feed their nephew, and he had been too busy thriving on the chaos of Harry's sandwich-making to ensure that Harry put food in his mouth. He couldn't help it. When he was around his son, he felt _alive _in a way he could never feel when they were apart.

The man laid the boy down in a pile of blankets on the floor and tucked him in. "I'll bring you some food," he said, stroking the dark, sweat-streaked hair. "Is there anything you'd like to eat?"

"Anything but sandwiches," Harry mumbled before closing his eyes and dozing off.

"Right," the father said, giving Harry a pat on the head before walking out to the kitchen to clean up and make his son some chicken noodle soup. He certainly couldn't count on the Dursleys, Harry's _caretakers, _to keep the boy fed.

He'd have to wait until Harry was feeling better; then he could dispense revenge on Vermin and The Tuna. He'd love to do it now, but there was always the chance that Harry's relatives would blame Harry for whatever well-deserved misfortune which befell them. Harry couldn't take another punishment when he was already weak from hunger and who knew what else.

Too bad they couldn't just tell Vernon and Petunia to suck it and fly far, far away. Unfortunately, he had to put up with them, and less-than-ideal living conditions, in order to see his son. He'd go through Hell if it meant his son knew him, would not forget the man who held him as an infant. Those four years they were separated were the worst years either of them had ever known.

Well, it was Dudley's birthday, so the Dursleys would all be out of the house today. Normally, they would arrange for Harry to be babysat by Mrs. Figg, who lived down the street, despite the fact that Harry's father would have been delighted to spend Dursley-free time with the boy. It was one of the passive-aggressive games Petunia played to make him look like a horrible dad. However, after Harry had what Petunia Dursley called "an episode," the Dursleys always kept him away from other people, lest someone spot Harry's abnormality.

So today, it would be just the two of them. He wasn't planning to go out today. He probably wouldn't go out for a couple of weeks, at least. He had earned enough to last them a while. Besides, Harry needed his father.

At any given moment, Harry was either higher than high, soaring above the frustratingly mediocre world, surrounded by a cloud of energy that could not be contained, or brooding and depressed, barely able to pull himself out of bed, too hopeless to even cry. The presence of Harry's father made these happy, hyper episodes much stronger and more frequent, which was perhaps part of the reason the Dursleys hated Harry's dad so much. When Harry was having one of what Petunia called "Fits of laziness," the rest of the family didn't even bother with him. When he was like this, he was, in the words of Aunt Petunia, "useless." All the threats in the world couldn't get him to do his chores, finish his schoolwork, or even pull himself out of bed.

For the boy's safety, he was best left to his father during these "slow" periods. His dad's presence never failed to pull Harry out of his slump. Dad wanted his son to be in a manic, energetic state as much as possible; it was then that Harry felt like he could accomplish anything. Harry privately felt that it was only during these "happy" periods that his dad had a son he could be proud of.

Right now, as he lay in the makeshift bed, Harry wanted nothing more than to spring up with a shout and run wild with his father, but he couldn't find the energy to move. He let out a moan, too exhausted to form words.

As if the universe sensed what Harry needed at that particular moment, Harry's father slipped into the cupboard, holding a bowl of soup. He carefully set the bowl down on the floor before slipping a few pillows under his son's head. When he was satisfied that Harry wouldn't choke on his breakfast/midnight snack, he scooped up as spoonful of chicken noodle soup, blew on it, and brought it to his son's mouth.

"I can feed myself," Harry pointed out. His father took the opportunity to push the spoon into Harry's mouth.

"You'll fall asleep before you've finished half the bowl if I leave you like this," his father, a veteran of many of Harry's "episodes," pointed out.

Harry didn't put up much of a fight. He never went against his father for very long, especially not now, when he was too tired to move. For a few minutes, he simply lay there, opening his mouth to receive another spoonful of soup. By the time the bowl was empty, Harry's eyelids had grown too heavy to keep open, and his head sank back into the pillows.

Harry's father lay on top of blankets, beside his sleeping son. Beyond that, he showed no signs of tiredness. His eyes remained open and wide awake, staring at the ceiling and listening to the sounds of the Dursleys waking up and the baby whale opening his mammoth pile of presents. He carded his fingers through Harry's sweaty locks and swore that this year, Harry would receive an even bigger birthday than Dudley; more presents; more treats; more exciting trips out on town. More, more, more of everything.

His son deserved more than that spoiled brat, and he would get more. He was certainly a better father than Vernon Dursley, and it was a father's job to provide for his family. It stood to reason that, despite their less-than-perfect circumstances, Harry's father should be able to provide more for his son than the wretched Vermin could ever give to Tuna and Dudders. This year, his son was going to have the perfect birthday.

As though he could hear his father's thoughts, Harry smiled in his sleep. In the background, Dudley crowed about receiving the expensive new video game he had been wanting while Harry's father pulled the sleeping boy into a hug and began planning.


End file.
